Simply trying to exist in this complicated universe.

I am focusing on myself this year. I have spent my entire life putting others first, not thinking twice. This of course can be a wonderful attribute to ones character, but becomes quite messy when it begins to take a toll on one’s health. I sacrifice myself for anyone over and over and over until…

I will not lie. I still miss him. I miss the way he’d pull me in, causing me to fall into him. I miss his incredibly beautiful genuine smile that only appeared once in awhile. I long for our car rides with music blasting and beating in time with our hearts. I miss watching him…

When we ended, it wasn’t peaceful. Now, I am still entirely broken and you are perfectly fine. You aren’t missing me and in fact, you are happier than you ever were with me. I am happy you are happy, please understand that. I just wish I could be the one inspiring that smile. Years…

When you kissed me that night, when you touched my cheek and gently turned it to face you, when your lips met mine that last time, when you kissed me and you knew you never would again, that was when all the angels fell.

Lately, I’ve been faking happiness acting like I’m okay when in actuality, all of my bones are shattered into dust remains and resting in the souls of my shoes. Before, I wasn’t really great at this. I was always told I was “as easy to read as a book” a simplistic book, I assumed. One…

After everything happened, the sobbing continued. I mean full on, ugly, pathetic sobbing even when I didn’t think I had any more tears or energy left in my body. My hands were shaking and I was gripping onto my legs like they were holding me to this damn planet. They were shaking and my fingers…

When you told me you still wanted to be in my life, I couldn’t read my own thoughts. I felt utter sadness yet also complete frustration. I will always want you in my life but not in that way. I don’t want you laughing across the table with my friends while I sit there, acting…

“I love you.” “I love you too.” From the very beginning, there was something there. We nurtured it and watched it bloom into something so incredibly profound. Nobody really understood but nobody questioned it. It was written in the oldest of tales. We were whole together. “I love you.” “Love ya too.” You began to…

It’s been a long time since I have written of myself, of how I am doing with life at the moment. Maybe too long, possibly not long enough. There isn’t really a way to tell. Things have been rather grand the past week or so. I became a part of something I never fathomed I…

It’s rather curious that each individual, each stranger has a life just as complex (if not more) as our own. It’s even more so bizarre that we can’t truly ever comprehend that. The man on the subway. His blank stare gives off little so nothing other than numbness, though there is something behind it. He has…

We are chaos. We fall apart just to fall back into each other. Our muscles are sore and cramping from trying to keep up and the world is spinning as our dizzy heads refuse to settle. There are moments of complete, entire bliss. We find a safe little latibule to reside within, at least before…

I wear my heart around my neck, now. It was covered by my sleeve and caged within my ribs. Here, on a delicate silver chain, it can be seen. It can feel. Here, it is vulnerable. Here, it can be cut. Bruised. Sliced. Torn. Battered. Beaten. Here, it can be destroyed. Here, it can be healed….

Coming up this December, it’ll be three years since I last saw you. Three years since I heard your voice, felt your warmth, existed with you. That doesn’t feel real. I wish it wasn’t. Hell, I’d do anything to have you back, healthy. That night, you were carried out the door in a black body…

TOBY A playlist. She needs a playlist. Eleanor is always stuck in her headphones and while I know she hears, listen, and cares about what I say, I know the truest way for her to get it is through music. I need to find 12 songs that express what my mouth can’t. “Eyes Of Blue: A…

ELEANOR “Today’s weather forecast shows light rain with mild cloud coverage. Don’t go out without an umbrella today, folks! Here’s DJ Dawn with-“ Tuesday. 5:45 A.M. May 16th. Riverton, Wyoming. 82501. I have 45 minutes until I need to be at Statistics, which is conveniently on the north end of the campus. My dorm lays…

There’s a quote my mom once explained to me years ago. I wanted to understand it, to see it the way she did, the way she wanted me to see it. I couldn’t quite grasp it, though. Years later, I have begun to comprehend the 33 words. “An entire sea of water can’t sink a…

TOBY She is so, so, so, so, so, so, so, just… damn. There’s not a word for her. She’s just her. She’s just Eleanor Alexis Paylor. She doesn’t need to be any more than that. She tells me she lives with “liberosis”, the desire to care less about things. I respect that she feels that way, but…

sometimes things just d w i n d l e d o w n to nothing. you can just feel disintegrating in your lungs in your left-side brain in your shoulders in your stomach as the acid rises in your shaking hands until it is all gone and nothing is left. nothing left but ashes and dust.

I have always wanted to see the world. You know that. I babble on and on endlessly to you about how I am desperate to just soak in the London rain and watch the sunsets Luxor. You also know I am not really the best with change, with packing my things and being on my…

ELEANOR Every sunrise in Riverton, Wyoming is nothing short of average, but each morning Toby is determined to make me see it the way he does. He calls me at ungodly hours of the morning telling me how “the stars are descending at such a pace that signifies a change in my morning attitude” and “the altocumulus…

You took me apart piece by piece. Separated each fragment of my body and my soul and laid me along the earth. I thought you looked at me like I was one of Neptune’s moons but I didn’t realize you were analyzing me the way a predator does prey. You pushed aside my poetry…

-Learn to love yourself before putting your love into another. Arden -High school is overwhelming. Don’t fall behind on your assignments. Arden -Find your passion. That’s when you’ll discover it doesn’t matter what people think. Maya S. -Loving yourself is the most important thing a girl can do. You can’t just say it, you have…

You destroyed me. Like, you really, really messed me up. Not the little paper cut that can be healed with a band aid. You left a gaping wound winding across my torso. Stitches became a joke and I was left to bleed onto that hallway carpet alone. I loved you. I knew I cared about you…

You are really underappreciated. I know I remind you constantly of how much I adore you and how deeply you’ve impacted my life. I don’t remind you enough, though. I could take every waking moment of each day for the next 30 years to tell you “I love you and you are important”. Assuming 8…

What is so wrong with me that I end up hurting everyone I come in contact with? Every person, every soul ends up tinged tainted tattered Is it something in my blood? Is there yet another chemical imbalance within my brain, creating every hopeful relationship I have with another person, only to mechanically turn it…

We are broken people. We are such chaotically, incredibly broken people. Rust carries worn out words through our veins. Our ears ring with the sounds of oceans and insincerity. We are two disasters; a hurricane and a volcanic eruption. Each of our worlds are so vastly different and complex. We are the daughter of Apollo and the son…

It’s weird; I’ve become sort of numb, used to feeling your absence now. It will tap me on the shoulder on occasion, but it never truly, fully hits me. I think I’ve blocked it out. I think I stopped allowing myself to feel such things awhile ago. It’s been so gradual and subtle that it didn’t phase…

You are still wrapped up in my blankets in a “cocoon” sitting on my floor with your back against my closet door. I am leaning on you head in your lap cushioned by several layers of my duvet and grey throw. I hear- no. I feel your heartbeat against my head gently through your band…

There are days, weeks even that I swear I am okay. All is okay until I hear a laugh that sounds vaguely like yours or see a sweater in a store that you would have adored. Everything collapses in those moments. I feel my stomach drop onto the pavement or the sterilized linoleum. Each of…

We could just sit for hours on end and just exist, just us and the air around us. Lungs filling with the humid atmosphere and exhaling gentle breath into the void hands entangled within the clay and grass blades pinkies latched together creating promises in our own silent language. I’d be happy with that. I could…

I want to cup your gentle face in my hands and tell you all of the endless wonders that I can see swimming in your eyes. I want to tell you the way I feel sunlight shine through our skin and clouds dance along our heads, as if we are skyscrapers. I want to tell you how…

Your sky is grey and I will paint it the most delicate yet brilliant shade of blue and show you how to create your own clouds. Your nights refuse to end so I watercolor you the most breathtaking sunrise that even the sun pauses to admire her own beauty. Your day drags on and on before…

I know when you are with somebody, they are supposed to make you happy, so incredibly happy that you feel like flying but when you smile I forget everything I was going to say and I feel my cheeks tighten as your smile is instantly contagious. The way you look at me makes me feel…

10 times a day I will remind you of my love (if not more). 9 times you will brush it off. 8 shades of green and golden brown encompass your pupil. 7 birthmarks create shapes of constellations and undiscovered land. 6 T-shirts of mine lay on your closet floor, wrinkled. 5 fingers wrapped around my arm…

Every night, the clock stops. Time freezes right between 2 and 3 A.M. Everything, everyone is still. I wait for this hour, this one hour where the entire world is mine. I wait each night to go and breath the crisp air and soak in the cobalt sky. Everything is so peaceful. So serene. All…

Sometimes I think about how you have never seen my blog. You’ve never read any of my work in the past (almost) three years or anything of which I have really felt proud. Honestly, I don’t quite remember what you did read. All I know is you always encouraged me to keep writing and writing…

“Here’s this boy. At first, he won’t see you. He will see you, but not really. Then, he’ll look over your way in the summer and he may take his first glance. Then, things will end because you fear hurting him because that’s the last thing you would ever want. He’s so beautiful and so…

“Josie…Joooosie…” I feel myself slowly floating back into wake as my little brother tugs on my satin pajama sleeve. “Hmmm?” I manage to grumble out, my voice still asleep, desperate for the rest I have needed for about 28 hours. “The fireworks. You said they were doing fireworks again tonight but I don’t see ’em. I…

C8H11NO2+C10H12N20+C43H66N12O12S2 The chemical formula for love. A substance that could produce the same feeling as love within an individual. A “love potion” brought into reality. I can’t believe I have it, finally. “Be careful, M. Overdosing on any of the substances can easily cause schizophrenia, extreme paranoia, and insanity. I trust you to use this…

“Love” is a four lettered word that I don’t understand and I’m not sure I ever will. You seem to be so sure of what it is, that it is something that echoes within your veins reassuring you each time. I know adoration and I know passion but I don’t quite think those are equivalent…

So, I entered a poetry contest. I submitted three poems; Bittersweet Sacrifices, Oh How You’ve Grown, and Rain. I wasn’t sure which of these would get the best response, if any response at all. I went into this contest excitedly, putting my work into the world. I didn’t expect to hear anything back from it….

I met his voice before I met his eyes. I heard him rambling on endlessly about the vast, empty but simultaneously overflowing universe. He would say the meaning of life could be found somewhere between the smell of fresh cinnamon rolls in the morning and forgiveness. To him,everything was a thought just waiting to be…